Beautifully Scarred

Chapter 45

•●•●•●• you're a warrior, warriors don't give up and they don't back down. Pick up your sword and your shield and fight back. •●•●•●•
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Bells
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My body slams down onto the hardwood floors of Lex's office. The wind is knocked out of me for a moment. A sharp pain shoots through my head, between each slap to my face and my screaming for Mawmaw, to say I have a headache would be an understatement.
As my senses come back to me, I hear a child weeping. Just as I glance up do I make eye contact with Sarahbeth while she is clinging tightly to Maggie. In the corner of the office Mia and Maggie sit close together. Each holding a crying baby. Baby Lee will not be calmed, his screaming is so frantic, poor Mia bounces him in her arms, trying her best to soothe her frightened newborn.

"Well, well," a voice all too familiar says from over me.

I roll over just enough to see the monster. Johnny is far too pleased with himself. Well, of course he should be. He just won the battle. Using my own mother against me but anything is fair in love and war, right?

"Stand up," he gives the command in calm even tone. It cover my skin in goosebumps.

On my feet I stand to face him. To be honest, I feel nothing. Not even the paralyzing fear that I had always assumed would come. No. I feel nothing. As if somewhere in my brain, a switch has been flipped, turning off any and all emotion. It has to be some type of survival tactic.
Johnny looks me up and down. Though I am still wearing my jet black clothes, he grins as if looking at my naked flesh. Time hasn't been good to him. Before he had at least been a halfway decent looking man. But now the years of dope and time in prison have taken a toll on him. On his arms and cheeks are deeply embedded scars, a few new wounds have been freshly picking into his skin. Most of his teeth have turned dark, some rotting out completely.
My mother looks in much better shape than he does. I wonder for a moment if she really had gotten clean at some point. And without thinking of what I am doing, I ask. The little girl that had never wanted to be heard from, now has a voice.

"Did you ever clean up?"

She stands to Johnny's right side. For the briefest moment, I thought I spotted a flash of sadness across her face.

"She had," Johnny answers for her. "Well, mostly. And she will again. We both will. Won't we baby?"

She gives him a small smile and nods her head. It's clear that she has been caught in his webb again. His hooks are just as deep as they always have been. It is sickening the way she falls for his lies. She might but I never will.

"You sober up? That's hilarious," I snap.

Johnny crosses his arms over his chest. A very impressed look on his wrinkled face. 

"You've gotten a bit more snappy since you were little."

I hold my head up. "I'm not a little girl anymore."

"Oh, she's still in there though. Still lost an alone. Unloved and unwanted."

"You're wrong," says a new voice from behind me. It's Mia. She has remained in the corner but she stands now. "She is wanted and loved more than she knows."

Only her words bring forth any emotions. Yet I am quick to force them back. I don't want to show any sign of weakness. He already knows what this family means to me and he is using them against me. They are in danger because they took me in. The last thing I want is for any harm to come to any of them.

"Isn't that just the sweetest thing you've ever heard? While I've been rotting in that cell, you've been out here, searching for the perfect family to bring you in. You're smart, you choose well."